Peer analysis comment, discussion evaluation response of Peer’s Essay #1, Peer’s Essay #2, Peer’s Essay #3
Peer Essay #1:
After reading the three articles from Foundations of Academic Success all of the authors had the
same type of persuasion in their articles which was basically to go off of their opinions and their
statements on what has happened in their life’s to make them think the way they do to help you
with your discussions in your own life.
The articles that I think I took the most from was “transferable” by Vicky Brown and ” Learn
What You Don’t Want by Jamie Edwards). In this article the author states that “sometimes you
have to learn what you don’t want in order to find out what you do want; which to me translates
to “each and every skill you acquire is transferable.” ( Edwards 42) (Brown 33). To me every
lesson in life doesn’t need to define who you are but help you learn from it and apply the skills or
advice you took away from it and learn from it in future positions. This helps you to gain
everything you can in every position you put yourself in, in life and to be open minded to those
around you for help to better yourself. Life isn’t every going to just be easy peasy, its going to
throw you challenges and the more skills you take from your acquired skills the more prepared
you’ll be.
Sources:
Brown, Vicky Foundations of Academic Success: Words of Wisdom “Transferable” Suny 2015
page 33
Edwards, Jamie.”Learn What You Don’t Want” Foundations of Academic Success: Words of
Wisdom., SUNY, 2015 pp 41-42.
Peer Essay #2:
Each author had their own sense of opinions about their eduction, after reading the articles I saw
that they all wanted us as readers to make our own decision for ourselves. Each author was
persuasive in the sense that they really wanted you to make your own decisions about your future
whether it be about what classes you are taking or what your major will be and what job you
want. A quote I really liked came from the article “Transferable” by Vicki L. Brown she states
“Each and every skill you learn throughout your academic, personal, and professional career are
valuable and transferable. Do not let your college degree define who you are but rather, let the
knowledge acquired define you. ” (Brown 33) That quote really shows that everything you learn
can be used later in life, don’t let your college degree determine where you go in life.
Sources:
Brown, Vicky Foundations of Academic Success: Words of Wisdom “Transferable” Suny 2015
page 33
Peer Essay # 3
Information is everywhere in the ultra-connected society we live in. Never in our history as a
species was limitless information accessible in seconds from devices found in your home, your
car, or even your pocket. The internet has made it incredibly simple to find information we want
in seconds. People have the ability to post just about anything they want to the world wide web.
This ability for everybody to opine on the internet means we have to carefully assess information
for validity and source credibility. In all three articles we read, one commonality was present ,
the subjective views presented in a professional article format. All three articles were written as
advice pieces from college staff members. Each article presented advice to college students from
personal and professional experience.
In “What Do You Enjoy Studying?” we find information presented by a counselor about
choosing a major. The author offers a perspective on how she helps students find what it is they
want to do with their lives. The author then goes on to advise the students to consult with faculty
staff and to fully research and map out their college course requirements to know what they are
getting into. The information presented is subjective information in a professional article. The
information in the article is subjective because it is the opinion of the author an not backed up
with cited empirical data. “Working in a college setting I have the opportunity to work with
students through all walks of life, and I do believe based on my experience, that choosing a
major because it is listed as a growth area alone is not a good idea” (Munsch 26). Even though
the author is a professional in their field, the information is not factual so it cannot be considered
objective. The intent of the author is to educate and inform, but the information is given as a
single perspective.
The second article “Transferrable,” the author describes how she always wanted to be an
elementary school teacher growing up. As the author progressed through college, she found that
the experience she gained being an Orientation Leader and Resident Assistant prompted her to
reconsider her career choices. She goes on to say that even though she had prepared herself for a
completely different career for the first part of her life, the skills were able to be used in other
fields as well. “Each and every skill you acquire is transferable. This is perhaps the best lesson
I’ve ever learned in college” (Brown 33). This article presents subjective information to the
reader. The author writes about their own experience and does not used sources or quantitative
data in their writing. Because this is written from a single perspective and offers little more than
advice, it can only be considered subjective information.
The last article, “Learn What You Don’t Want,” was written by another college staff member
who shared their academic experience. Like the previous author, they wanted to be a teacher but
found that they preferred another path in college. The author goes on to give four separate bullet
points of advice on how to narrow your views as a student. Again we find information written by
a professional in the field that offers perspective and personal advice. “Whether you’re an
undecided major who is looking for guidance or a student with a clearly defined career path, I
suggest the following…” The use of the word “suggest” shows that this is opinion and therefor
cannot be objective information.
All of the information in the articles is good advice from people who work in their field and who
have found success. But the information they present cannot be considered objective due to lack
of facts. I believe that the article that provides the best information is from “What Do You Enjoy
Studying.” This was the only article where the author clearly stated that she worked in the field
as a counselor. The other authors identified that they were college administrators, but not directly
working with students relative to the topics they wrote about. In evaluating source credibility,
somebody who works in the field offering professional advice would be more credible than
somebody sharing their own experience. As such, I feel that Dr. Patricia Munsch had the best
information in her article.
Works Cited
Brown, Vicki L. “Transferrable.” Foundations of Academic Success: Words of Wisdom, edited
by Priester, Thomas C, SUNY Open Textbooks, 2015 pp. 33-34.
Edwards, Jamie. “Learn What You Don’t Want.” Foundations of Academic Success: Words of
Wisdom, edited by Priester, Thomas C, SUNY Open Textbooks, 2015 pp. 41-42.
Munsch, Patricia. “What Do You Enjoy Studying?” Foundations of Academic Success: Words of
Wisdom, edited by Priester, Thomas C, SUNY Open Textbooks, 2015 pp. 26-27.
Read the following quote from “Types of Resources: Categorizing Sources” from Choosing &
Using Sources:
“In today’s complex information landscape, just about anything that contains information can be
considered a source.”(p. 25).
In the light of your understanding of this quote, evaluate the type of information presented by the
authors in the three articles you are required to read this week. What type of information do the
three articles present and which article do you find the most beneficial and why? (Is the
information persuasive, scholarly, factual…?) Include a quote from the readings to support your
opinion and cite it using the MLA style.
__________________________________________________________________________________
In week 2, you completed your first Milestone, which is your research plan. In week 3, you will be
preparing to complete your Milestone 2, which is due at the end of week 4. So, this week is
instrumental to learn about the types of sources and information that you need to use in your
annotated bibliography and research. The focus is going to be on evaluating sources and types of
information and categorizing them. To help you with the task of evaluating sources of information
for the purpose of research and categorizing them, you will read articles from Foundations of
Success and the chapter about categorizing sources from Choosing & Using Sources. In Foundations of
Success, we have chosen three articles for you to evaluate as sources of information: Edwards’
“Learn What You Don’t Want,” Dr. Munsch’s “What Do You Enjoy Studying,” and Brown’s
“Transferrable.” We would like you to evaluate the information and its sources in these three
articles qualitatively. How do the authors present their information and what types of information is
it? We also would like you to categorize these articles by applying the information you will read in
the chapter about the “Types of Sources.” Are these articles objective/factual, persuasive/opinionbased, scholarly, primary, secondary, tertiary, quantitative, or qualitative? (pp. 25-45). The
assignments and discussion posts will focus on these main points to assess your understanding of
evaluating information and categorizing it.
Week 3 Lecture – Evaluating and Categorizing Sources
This week, you are learning about an important part of research and
that is evaluating and categorizing sources. This lecture is
instrumental to your understanding of types of sources and
information and categorizing them. Most of the time, you are faced
with so much information and you start to wonder about what it
means to you and how you can use it. In research, it is very important
to think of your sources very critically. The first thing that you have
to do is define information, evaluate it, and then categorize it in order
to determine whether you will use it or not. You will also need to
determine the capacity in which you will use it.
So, what is information? Think about a definition from your
perspective and then look it up in the dictionary. Your definition of
the word “information” from your own perspective is a personal
source of information for the person who is listening to you; however,
when you look it up in the dictionary, the dictionary becomes your
source of information. Therefore, you have to categorize the
information you receive from the dictionary: Is the dictionary a
primary, secondary, or tertiary source? The dictionary provides you
with information compiled from primary and secondary sources,
which would make us categorize the dictionary as a tertiary source.
This is just one example of a type of source that readers and
researchers use to find information and use it. Categorization helps
researchers to determine the relevance and reliability of the sources
consulted and used. This is going to be very beneficial to you in your
work on assembling an annotated bibliography.
Make sure you read the pages 25-36 in Choosing & Using Sources to
learn about the types of sources and how they are categorized.
This is a list of some of the popular types of sources:
Books
Ebooks
Websites
Blogs
Magazines
Journals
Newspapers
Pamphlets
Conferences
Research Reports
TV Documentaries
Radio Programs
Web Media
Photographs/Images/ Art
Now think of the categories that these types of sources belong to:
Quantitative
Qualitative
Primary
Secondary
Tertiary
Professional
Popular
Scholarly
Factual
Persuasive
Please take the time to check the helpful supplementary resources.